Some kids this age do in fact smell bad. Daily shower!

We don't do showers, we have my kid splash around in the bird bath for a while in the backyard every few months.





(...how is this a question? we do daily showers)

Anonymous wrote:We seem to run out of time for a shower most nights. Is showering once or twice a week before puberty gross? She doesn't play a ton of sports and doesn't smell. I'm just finding working in more frequent showers challenging between activities, reading time, homework, etc.

A 9 year old showers in 10 minutes, including thick hair. Don't you have 10 minutes?

Daily, except for Saturday.

Every single day. And anything less would be gross.

Nasty how they don’t clean their ass crack for a week

We have a 13 year old who has not started puberty. He showers after he has been out doing anything leading to sweating, so after sports practice, and after he has been swimming. Otherwise he takes a shower every other day. He knows he will need to take a shower daily when he starts puberty and the BO kicks in.

I lived in Europe, my college age roommates bathed twice a week, that is why they wore perfume and cologne. They were all healthy and perfectly fine. Bathing too frequently is actually bad for your skin and hair.

The obsession with showering and being totally clean is very much an American thing.

OP, your child is fine with bathing every other day. But yes, make sure she knows how to wipe after pooping, that is a hygiene thing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daily shower, washing hair every other day. It takes literally 5 minutes to properly soap the body and rinse. Additional 5 minute when washing hair. Do better at parenting.

Wow. Do better at kindness, and not judging and shaming other people.

I hope this isn’t how you treat your kids and isn’t the example you set for them.

It’s pretty gross not to bathe daily or every other day. The weekly is lazy parenting.

These are like comments middle schoolers make. Ewwwww! You are sooooa gross! There’s no way an intelligent adult is behind this post.

Where do you think the middle schoolers get that attitude?

Once kids are in full-fledge puberty, once a week will definitely not cut it and other kids will likely tease them for smelling bad (because they will smell bad! puberty does that).

I'm not counting the swimmers in the thread who are showering post pool and then just doing one shower at home weekly. A pool shower is a shower and will address body odor and general cleanliness. So I'm just talking about kids who truly are just taking one shower a week at age 9. It's not enough, and it's going to make it especially tough when they start having body odor and you have to try and get them to suddenly start taking more showers right as they are being hit with hormonal issues.

My 4th grade DD showers every day and washes her long, thick hair every other day. Her hair starts to smell if she leaves it longer than that, but she has no BO yet. My older DS started with BO after sports by 2nd grade. He showers sometimes 2x/day.

I will let them be lazy and skip a day on Fridays if we aren't doing much. It's my personal preference for them to smell freshly washed, hair especially. I don't think they are particularly "dirty" after a day of not bathing, provided they are washing their hands/face, wearing clean clothes, etc.

I let my almost-9 year old skip a shower if she has a late activity or if we've just been hanging out at home all day. Otherwise she showers daily. I won't have her wash her hair, or will just have her do a co-wash, unless it needs it (her hair is very prone to dryness and frizz so daily shampooing is not a good idea).

For me it's about building a habit. One reason kids this age fight showers is they struggle with transitions and still think of the transition to the shower as hard. But it's something you have to do, like brushing your teeth or hair. You can't skip it just because you don't feel like it.

Also kids this age are just about to hit puberty when daily showering becomes really important. So getting in the habit before that happens is a good idea. Not just for hygiene reasons (though definitely yes, for hygiene) but for social reasons too -- you don't want to be sending your kid to school smelling of body odor in middle school when kids can be very harsh towards each other. Especially true for girls -- I remember girls in my middle school being horribly cruel to anyone they perceived as not being sufficiently clean. It's an obnoxious behavior, but why make your kid a target? Just encourage daily hygiene until it becomes habit and then it's one less thing for them to worry about.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daily. I don’t understand how she run out of time to take a shower. It takes 10 min.

+1 my DD claims that some of her classmates smell bad. Now I know why.

Maybe they say she smells bad.

Anonymous wrote:Our kid is a competitive swimmer who swims three times a week. She has very dry skin. So beyond showers at the pool, she does one shower/bath per week. This is the recommendation her pedetrician - and it works for us.

That’s what all doctors recommend. If you’re in pool water you need to wash it off. Give your skin a break on the other days. Water is drying to the skin. Do some face cloth soap and water washing at areas that need it if you have to on off days. Save on water. It’s common sense.

Anonymous wrote:Daily. I don’t understand how she run out of time to take a shower. It takes 10 min.

+1 my DD claims that some of her classmates smell bad. Now I know why.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daily shower, washing hair every other day. It takes literally 5 minutes to properly soap the body and rinse. Additional 5 minute when washing hair. Do better at parenting.

Wow. Do better at kindness, and not judging and shaming other people.

I hope this isn’t how you treat your kids and isn’t the example you set for them.

It’s pretty gross not to bathe daily or every other day. The weekly is lazy parenting.

These are like comments middle schoolers make. Ewwwww! You are sooooa gross! There’s no way an intelligent adult is behind this post.

Our kid is a competitive swimmer who swims three times a week. She has very dry skin. So beyond showers at the pool, she does one shower/bath per week. This is the recommendation her pedetrician - and it works for us.